Philoshop
I
need to go to prison. For I, Edward Michael Hobson, stole Photoshop. Instead of
turning to such disreputable activities as prostitution, dealing crack on the
turnpike, or collateralised debt speculation to raise the requisite 350 Dollars
American, I was forced
to go
a-piratin’. It works, I’m glad it’s there; it reminds me of my 6th form college days doing graphic design
on Wednesdays. I’ve made some artwork with it and plastered it on Facebook like
a child sticking finger paintings onto the fridge. I’m sure many other people
have acquired Photoshop in this way and used it for touching up photos and
drawing genitalia on foreheads alike. But if you can just pluck Photoshop from
the internet like grabbing an apple off a market stall and shoving it into your
pocket, can anyone be a good artist? The ready availability of cameras, image
manipulation programs, and a great canvas to paint one’s vision on, has, in the
mind of many, stripped the elitism of artistry, putting mere mortals on the
same level as the masters of the arts.
We’re all agreed
that democracy is a good thing, and that democratisation of healthcare, education,
and the political process are as beneficial to the common good as a cold drink
on a hot day, but what about the tools to make art? Surely giving everyone the
tools is possible, being simply a matter of empirically improving the
technology and the access to it, but making everyone an artist is impossible,
as that is a matter of personal ability and talent. On the internet, anyone can
post anything and say anything all simultaneously, which has made critics of us
all. Anyone who watches Question Time will be aware of the bbcqt hashtag which
allows people to comment with a likeminded community of individuals on the
proceedings playing out on screen. Although this has the side effect of
transforming Theresa May, Home Secretary into Theresa May, Space Dentist.
So, the answer
to the question should be no. But this brings to the fore the nature of talent.
Is it naturally occurring or developed from a position of rudimentary knowledge
to one of greater knowledge? I never liked using Photoshop at college until my
lecturer told me that I was good at it. So from my experience, the ready
availability of the technology is a good thing, and proves to people who have
no idea what Photoshop is that they can be good at it. But somehow, I don’t
feel that way. The aforementioned Theresa May can be scrutinised through the
rigorous analysis of her policies and positions, or she can be scrutinised by
the Space Dentist people. The public sphere is, regrettably, a poor place for
measured, considerate discussion, wherein the most extreme; controversial; or
even just the most laughable opinions gravitate to the surface at the expense
of prescience or insight. Forgive me for not having much confidence in the
wisdom of crowds. For example, these crowds never stop whining about the
Underground when many cities in Britain don’t have one, and are bafflingly
happy to live in a monarchy. Not everyone can be an artist for the same reason
not everyone can bring themselves to care about philosophy, or comment on the
news, (despite the existence of countless “Have Your Says”) because many people
go through life without any thought about artistry, philosophy, or politics.
This isn’t a
pejorative; those people live in “the real world” and are quite proud that they
don’t clog the day to day running of their mind with such extraneous blah as
“What is Beauty?” or “Is This Art?” Let’s be a little frank here, if art, or
for the sake of argument, philosophy, were widely discussed and commented on by
the world and his dog, we’d have lots of new people to talk to, but maybe
they’d cease to be special, and they’d lose much of their appeal. I know that
I’d have nothing to talk about at parties for a start. To deploy a rusty old
maxim that a lecturer often quoted to me, you can take a horse to water, but
you can’t make it drink. It’s possible that we are the elitists by nature, if
only due to the normative values ascribed to the arts and the humanities in
general, as opposed to the nobler, materialistic, economically quantifiable
mathematics and sciences. So, thinking realistically, not everyone is going to
“get it”, but is attempting to strip the elitism from the arts and the
humanities itself elitist? Is it not prescriptive of what we think the people
should be thinking about? If you’ve ever been on the Moscow Metro, (which, for
full disclosure, I have never had the pleasure) then you may think it is. The
major stations are adorned with works depicting the ideals of the communist
state; renaissance- type statues of hardworking proletarians; mosaics of young
fresh faced paratroopers descending from the heavens like angels, these works
of art are created by an elite to prescribe the people to think in a certain
way. If rhetoric is an art, then art is surely rhetorical.
So, if you’ll
excuse me, I have to go and get measured for convict stripes. Responses on a
postcard to Pentonville please.
By Ed Hobson
